Buckeye Sampler: Cuyahoga voting woes affect all of us

Ted DanielsPublished: August 23, 2006 12:00AM

Buckeye Sampler
Cuyahoga voting woes
affect all of us
Excerpts of recent editorials of statewide and national interest from Ohio newspapers.
A three-month review of Cuyahoga Countys May 2 primary election generated more questions than answers. Ohioans need answers.
The key question is whether new electronic voting machines supplied by Diebold of North Canton are flawed or whether poll workers inexperience with the new system caused the problems.
Poll workers errors certainly played a role in the discrepancies discovered in a $341,000 study by a San Francisco consulting company. Missing data prevented the consultant, Election Science Institute, from assessing the accuracy of the Diebold machines. ...
What happens in Ohios largest county often has a direct bearing on statewide races and issues. ESIs project manager, Steven Hertzberg, worries that the discrepancies, unless corrected by Cuyahoga County, could pose big problems in a close race on Nov. 7. ...
Cuyahoga County needs to get to the bottom of the primary-election discrepancies, even if a definite answer cant be achieved in advance of the Nov. 7 election. ...
The Columbus Dispatch
Aug. 21
Charter school results proof
experiment was flawed
Another year of state report cards, another flare-up in the battle over Ohios charter schools. ... The state legislature bears most of the blame for the rocky history.
It wrapped an educational experiment in a partisan agenda to privatize public education. It raced to expand the program with little regard for oversight and quality, all on the premise charter schools could take the worst performers from the public schools and turn them around at about half the cost. Charter schools find they need identical levels of financial support as public schools to achieve the mission.
Seven years into the charter experiment, what should grab the attention of both the public and policymakers is just how closely the experiences of charter schools are mirroring those of the much-maligned public schools. ...
Akron Beacon Journal
Aug. 20
What would Mickey think about debate over planets?
If Pluto hadnt been a planet, would have Mickey named his dog?
This is just one of several cosmic questions that comes to mind in the debate over whether Pluto is our solar systems ninth and most distant planet from the sun or just a cold little rock spinning aimlessly through space. ...
Pluto, named for the Roman god of the underworld, differs from the eight inner planets ... in that it is a lot smaller and has an orbit more elliptical than circular. ... Its even smaller than originally thought, and there are a lot of other pieces of rock and ice out in that part of the solar system, known as the Kuiper Belt, including some that are bigger than Pluto. ...
It would be ridiculous not to reclassify the planets based on the most up-to-date knowledge.
As to whether todays science would have caused Mickey Mouse to rename his dog to even consider such a thing is Goofy.
Cincinnati Enquirer
Aug. 21